UT annual event to celebrate banned books

What do “The Diary of Anne Frank,” Dr. Seuss’ “The Lorax” and the Quran all have in common? All of them can be found on lists of frequently banned books.

Each of them will be celebrated, along with hundreds of other books, at the 17th Annual UT Banned Books Week Vigil from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sept. 25.

The vigil will feature 12 censorship-themed presentations from community members. Paulette Kilmer, University of Toledo communications professor who heads the event committee, said she likes to give the presenters free rein.

“I’m only strict that they keep [their presentation] under 20 minutes because I don’t want it to feel like another lecture,” she said. “Otherwise, I encourage them to discuss what they’re passionate about.”

The free event is open to both students and the public. Attendees can also expect games, door prizes, food and music. Additionally, copies of commonly banned or challenged books will be given away throughout the day.

The vigil will be held in the Carl Joseph Reading Room of the library, which is normally a quiet study area. Kilmer said it’s one of the few times the library is allowed to get noisy.

“One of our goals is to get in as many people as we can so that anyone walking outside can hear us,” she said.

Kilmer said the event is a collaborative effort, and the committee tries to make every year unique. The vigil has opened itself up to other mediums, like comic books, video games and films. Past events have included sit-ins, a Mark Twain impersonator, and viewings of select “South Park” and “The Simpsons” episodes.

“It’s very special because it’s a unique formula,” Kilmer said. “It combines the fellowship of meeting with the intellectual benefits of listening.”

Almost every department and school at UT, as well as multiple local businesses and community members, have donated either funds or door prizes this year. With all the funds, Kilmer said, she was able to purchase about $1,500 worth of banned books.

“We have more support this year than we have ever gotten,” she said. “We can make it a better event, and we can make it so that when people come over here they really have fun.”

The vigil is part of the American Library Association’s Banned Books Week, an annual campaign meant to bring awareness to censorship throughout the world and celebrate reading.

“I consider this, as much as anything, a holiday for reading,” Kilmer said. “It’s one time in our busy schedules where we can stop to reflect on what a wonderful gift reading is for all of us.”

Kilmer remembers attending the first vigil when it was held at Thackeray’s Books, a now-closed local bookstore. Originally, it was a 24-hour event where volunteers would read selections from banned or challenged books.

“It was really fun. My students and I, we took the graveyard shift, and then we’d go to breakfast afterwards,” she said.

Kilmer helped move the vigil to UT in 2000 and fought to keep it alive.

“It was four or five years that we really struggled,” she said. “Now we’re here with the library, which is where we belong.”

The vigil is very important to Kilmer, who was instilled with a love for reading as a child.

“My mother read books with me and my brother, and then we’d sit on the front porch and talk about the book while we drank lemonade,” Kilmer recalled. “That was one of the best gifts my mom gave me.”

Kilmer hopes everyone who attends the vigil has a great time and takes away a little knowledge.

“I hope they leave thinking about how incredibly fortunate we are to live in a country where we have the right to read and nobody has the right to tell us what we’re going to read,” she said. “The right to read is the right to think freely.”

The Banned Books Week Vigil is on the fifth floor of Carlson Library at UT’s Main Campus, 2801 W. Bancroft St. For more information, visit www.facebook.com/UTBannedBooks.

Toledo Free Press is a sponsor of the vigil and Managing Editor Sarah Ottney is one of the event speakers.

Oct. 10 Banned Books Vigil celebrates right to read

The University of Toledo is honoring the right to read freely with its 16th annual Banned Books Week Vigil event, complete with snacks, prizes and even cartoons, on Oct. 10.

Paulette Kilmer, UT journalism professor

“We are going to have lots of good stuff. And one new thing we’re doing is a tribute to animation, the cartoons,” said Paulette Kilmer, a UT journalism professor and the event’s coordinator. She said she is grateful for the continued support from sponsors and the community.

As part of the cartoon tribute, “The Simpsons” episode “500 Keys,” in which Lisa discovers a room full of banned books at her school, will air at 10:30 a.m. The “South Park” episode “The Tale of Scrotie McBoogerballs,” which features a unique spin on “The Catcher in the Rye,” will air at 3 p.m.

Although the American Library Association’s (ALA) Banned Books Week took place Sept. 22?28, UT’s event is set for 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Oct. 10 in the Carl Joseph Reading Room on the fifth floor of the Carlson Library. In addition to the cartoon airings, several speakers, including students, teachers and activists, will talk about a topic of their choosing.

Cindy Ramirez, an English teacher at Bedford Senior High School, is one of the speakers. Her presentation “You Can’t Teach That!” is set for 4 p.m.

Ramirez said she assigns a banned book project to her students and gives them extra credit for attending the vigil.

“I don’t even have to push them to work. They are interested in it,” she said.

Ramirez said she has come across issues with teaching controversial books.

“Sometimes I’ve had parents say, ‘I don’t want my kids reading that book,’ and I have to honor that,” she said.

“Especially in the school system, parents want to shelter their kids and they think that if they don’t read about [controversial topics], they won’t be exposed to that and will have better lives.”

Kilmer stressed that banned books aren’t just an issue in elementary and high schools, but also at the collegiate level and at public libraries.

“We have been told by people in the area that, ‘Oh, it’s just grade school and maybe a few high schools’ and no, the problem is much, much more than that,” she said.

From 2000-09, there were 1,217 challenges to books in public libraries, 114 in college classrooms and 30 in academic libraries, according to the ALA.

Freedom to Read

Arjun Sabharwal, one of the event’s committee members and a UT assistant professor and digital initiatives librarian, said, “This is our 16th anniversary here so from time to time, it’s necessary to remind the public that it is important to maintain their freedom to read. That is an ongoing discussion on a public level. There are governments who are pulling books; there are community organizations that are doing that on the smaller level and affecting libraries.”

The archivist has his own personal experiences with reading controversial books. Sabharwal and his family left former Soviet-controlled Hungary about 30 years ago. He recalled the impact “1984” and other such books had on him at the time.

“I had a copy of [‘1984’] because someone had given me a copy in Austria so I read it real quick because I had to give the book back,” he said of George Orwell’s tale of a society tightly controlled by “Big Brother.”

“When I read that book, I was really horrified about what the government could do to turn even lovers against each other.”

Sabharwal said that in Hungary, “A lot of the books weren’t really banned [as much as] they were prevented from being published because that was the system. The institution of printing/publishing was under state control.”

Ultimately, many of the people who want to ban books haven’t actually read the material, Kilmer said.

She added, “What books we read, if they’re not good, they won’t withstand the test of time. And if they are good, they’ll be recognized as literature.”

“If they really and truly have no redeeming quality, they’ll disappear on their own. They don’t need anybody else to say we can’t have them.”

Those who attend the free event will have the chance to win several door prizes and banned books. Anyone who wishes to donate a book to the giveaway can select a title from the ALA list at http://www.ala.org/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/classics or donate cash. Those wishing to donate should inquire at the UT Bookstore, 1430 Secor Road, Toledo, or contact Colleen Strayer at toledo@bkstore.com.

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UT observes Banned Books Week

Paulette Kilmer remembers being sent home from school for bringing “A Tree Grows in Brooklyn” into the classroom. Although her teachers had not read the book, they labeled it inappropriate.

“I remember thinking, ‘People really are afraid’,” Kilmer said.

Kilmer, the founder of the Banned Books Week event at the University of Toledo, said approximately 500 students participated in the vigil last year. This is the 13th year UT will host the event. Prior to having the vigil on campus, Kilmer said she used to take her students to a Banned Books Week reading at Thackeray’s Books.

“The basic freedom — our whole way of life, our democracy, our culture, is built from this right to read and think freely. If we can’t read freely then someone can manipulate us like we’re robots. We can be programmed,” Kilmer said.

UT will host its Banned Books Week Vigil Program Sept. 30. The event begins at 9 a.m. in Sullivan Hall, room 2030, and ends with a song performance at 5:30 p.m. Speakers from various university departments and the local community will address historic and contemporary issues surrounding the First Amendment and censorship. A banned book will be given away every half hour.

Paulette Kilmer

Engaging discussion

Recurring themes in many banned books include sex, abuse, rape and homosexuality, said Glenn Sheldon, honors professor of humanities in the honors college at UT. Sheldon is the keynote speaker for the Sept. 30 event.

Think for yourself

Sept. 25 to Oct. 2 marks the American Library Association’s (ALA) celebration of Banned Books Week. The week’s slogan is, “Think for yourself and let others do the same.”

“The purpose of Banned Books Week is to remind people that their freedom to read is a right all Americans should hold dearly and not take for granted,” said Barbara Jones, director of the Office of Intellectual Freedom for the ALA in Chicago.

According to the Office for Intellectual Freedom, 460 challenges to books and literature were reported in 2009. None of the infractions were in Northwest Ohio.

“Books are powerful — I think ideas are powerful. We need to engage with those ideas,” Jones said. “It really doesn’t help you to ban a book — it doesn’t solve your problem or keep your kids away from these ideas either. Parents want to prevent their children from reading about drugs. Chances are, in the 21st century, children are going to find out about drugs.”

Freedom to think

“Every year, something else is going on. Last year we were talking a lot about the Harry Potter cutting parties,” Kilmer said. “The battle is never over.”

Jones, Kilmer and Sheldon discussed the national attention Pastor Terry Jones of Gainesville, Fla. garnered for threatening to burn the Quran.

“To burn a book, it doesn’t get rid of that idea,” Jones said.

“People turn mean, and they want a scapegoat. They want something and someone to blame. If they can target a book, that’s something concrete. They can take out all their frustration and anger,” Kilmer said.

Censorship in schools

Sheldon said most books are banned and challenged in K-12 school districts when the content of reading material is questioned. Sex, drugs, religion, politics and language continue to be the primary objections parents have with books their children read in school, Jones said.

About two-thirds of the challenges between 2001 and 2009 were in schools and libraries; 48 percent of all challenges came from parents.

“Some things never change. I would say in this country, political books usually don’t get censored. People continue to worry about sex and people engaging in sex too early,” Jones said. “Any books with the n-word, like ‘To Kill a Mockingbird,’ which has the word 58 times.”

Brian Hickam, former librarian for UT’s College of Health Science and Human Services, has been involved with the university’s Banned Books Week since he joined the staff in 2004.

“It’s about more than books. The freedom to view, listen, think,” Hickam said. “We need to uphold our freedoms and remember that censorship is always a possibility.”

This year’s event is dedicated to Hickam, who is leaving the university.

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